Question
A three-month-old girl has been experiencing discharge in her eyes since ten days after birth. The doctor diagnosed her with infant conjunctivitis and initially prescribed chloramphenicol eye drops and streptomycin eye ointment, which reduced the discharge. However, she began to cry excessively and the symptoms persisted. After switching to tobramycin eye drops, the condition did not improve, and there was continued tearing and discharge accumulation under the lower eyelid near the inner corner of the eye, causing great concern to her parents.
Answer
Under normal circumstances, infants aged 2 to 3 months may have some discharge in the morning due to their eyelashes growing inward, which stimulates the production of discharge. This usually resolves by the time they are one year old as their eyelashes naturally grow outward. Therefore, treatment is usually not necessary. A warm towel or cotton swab dipped in a 2% boric acid solution can be used gently to wipe from the inner corner of the eye to the outer corner to remove the discharge. If there is a whitish substance on the baby’s eyes at birth, this is not discharge but known as “vernix,” which serves to protect the skin and prevent heat loss. Vernix will naturally absorb and should not be wiped away at random.